Kunal Khemu seems to have broken the jinx that has been associated with the male child actors in the Hindi film industry by being able to bag a tailor made role for himself in TRAFFIC SIGNAL and has announced his arrival with panache. He would probably be the first male star, who had enjoyed success as the child artist and has been liked by the audience after he has grown adult as well. This may also have to do with the fact that the role that he essayed in TRAFFIC SIGNAL was a character of the road, which was against the image that he had made for himself as a child artist.

His arrival has to be termed as a point of departure for the industry as his predecessors who were mega stars in child hood could not reap the same success when they became adult. Notable examples in this category include, Mayur, Master Raju and Alankar Joshi. They had huge success as two of them portrayed the young character of Amitabh Bachchan in majority of the films that they acted in, and most of the films were super duper hits, so their successes had a positive fall out with both Mayur and Master Raju. However, they could not step outside the image that had formed around them, of being the young Amitabh Bachchan and therefore could not get the desired breaks. Mayur got a chance to work in IMAANDAR, the Sanjay Dutt starrer produced by Prakash Mehra, but Master Raju could not get the same chance so he acted in few inconsequential roles in television serials and is now out of orbit, as also Mayur and Alankar Joshi.

In case of Kunal Khemu his advantage was that he had major successes in RAJA HINDUSTANI and there also he did not play a younger role of the hero, but had a role along with the hero Aamir Khan and his other success was also in the Mahesh Bhatt directed movie HUM HAIN RAHEE PYAAR KE where again his role had a continuation through out the film. It seems precisely for this reason his acceptance quotient with the audience when he grew adult has been on a higher side.

The earlier example of a star having a successful run both as a child artist and as an adult actor is that of Shashi Kapoor who was a young Raj Kapoor in most of the films, and had a pretty charming run as a celebrity star of all times.

In case of female child artists, the references are rather more successful, and the celebrity examples are Nitu Singh, Saarika etc., who had a successful run as adult actors, while Pallavi Joshi had an interesting run in the television and she still continues to hold theforte there in one form or the other.

Therefore a trend has been established by Kunal of being able to make a name for him in the industry when he grew adult, and now he has to live up to the reputation and does not become a one-film wond.